The Road Not Taken
by delicate monstrosities
Summary: Series of Drabbles. A young man, Connor Burns, seeks redemption after his family is murdered. Along the way he befriends a detective, finds a mentor in an artist named Sarah, and learns that love can be found even after death.
1. One: Navigate

Detective Sal Hirsch Dug his cigarette into the asphault as he crossed the street to his favorite hot dog stand. He turned his direction to the sky and a black mass flew at his face.

"God damn!" He choked out as his hands batted the bird away from his face. It's wings retracted and it flew off into the corner of a darkened alley. "What the hell is that thing doing in the city anyway?"

"Watching over you, Detective, along with every innocent soul in this city." His voice was soft and playful as he removed himself from the shadows.

"You're that guy." Detective Hirsch dropped the lighter in his hand. "The guy hatcheting Mooky's group."

"No, he hacheted my family, you see, and now I have to hachet the man that played him fowl." His caked face smiled in glee.

"Oh." Hirsch grunted and watched the crow land on the clown's shoulder, it's glowing eyes staring at him. He didn't like birds, he had enough bad experiences with them as a child. "Why's that freaky ass bird got to follow you around for?"

"Why, Detective, he is my friend, my protector." The man shifted from the brick wall he was leaning on and motioned forward to Hirsch as he stood half on the curb, half in the street. "Don't you know?"

"Know what?" Detective Hirsch grimaced as the bird flapped it's wings noisely and declawed itself from it's friend's shoulder.

"Crow's are sacred to our lives." The man stopped in front of Sal and the lights of the hot dog stand lit up his face. It wasn't a man, but just a boy. A boy with white powder rubbed on his cheeks and an eyeliner drawn under each eye. It was a sad face to look at, but Sal just stared head on at the boy. "You see, Detective, crows navigate our souls to the next life. They make sure that everything is right when we die. However, if we do not accept the death and there is much to be amiss, they bring that person back. Show him the errors of his ways, and leads him back to the next world."

"That would be you?" Sal looked up as the bird made circles in the smoky night sky. "He navigates you to kill people?"

"Redemption, Hirsch." The boy muttered. "When life gives you a second chance, you don't take any more. What those men got was what they deserved, however, the man who sent them will receive a fate worse than death. Eternal pain."

Hirsch shrugged. The kid was giving him a case of the heebie jeebies. Now he was not so sure he wanted to down a fully loaded hot dog right now.

"Have a good evening, Detective." The boy smiled and waved a friendly hand before letting the crow perch his outstretched arm. He evaporated into the shadows as quickly as he emerged from them.

"Strange kid, Wonder what tv shows he watches..." Hirsch bent over and picked his lighter up before heading to the stand for a loaded chili dog: his favorite.


	2. Two: Dangerous

"Hold still, bitch." As Red carved the skull into the young woman's cheek. His knife was sharp against the pale flesh of the whore beneath his hands. And that blood poured down her cheek like thick syrup as he dug deeper into her skin. The woman writhed under his weight and he could hear her pleas against the wooden table her head was smashed on.

"Dabbling in the arts again, Red?" A smooth voice called out from behind the man. Red paused and whipped his head around to a shadow in the corner of the poorly lit room. The man withdrew his form from the the dark to appear to be some kind of clown. Red didn't know the asshole, but he didn't like people coming in his home and disturbing him during his creative process.

"Get the fuck outta here right now, man, or I'll gut you so fast your intestines will be spewing all over my fucking kitchen floor!" He lifted the knife from the girl's face and pointed it toward the Joker wannabe. "I'm warning you!"

"And I'm warning you." The painted face came closer as his lips uttered those lines matter-of-factly. "Knives are dangerous, you could lose an eye if you are not careful."

"You'll fucking lose two goddamn arms if you don't get the fuck out!" Red spit out from under his scruffy beard.

"Go ahead, Red Jarvis." The smile that came to the man's face was one of jubilant and childish glee. "Take your best stab!" The man let the last line out in a sing-song voice and danced closer to the knife. "Just dig in." The man's caked white face was less than a foot away from him.

"You are fucking crazy!" Red backed up.

"No, I just have friends in high places it seems." He smiled and a crow soared across the little kitchen onto the counter.

"Get that filthy animal out of my house!" He screamed, jamming the knife in the freak's face while holding his bitch down. She cried out as the knife inched in the stranger's face.

"Hmm...that's what I said too." The man paused in thought, Red was dumbfounded by this comment because he had no idea who this man was or what he wanted. Then a sharp jab smashed into his face, right into his nose. Out spilled numerous, obscene curse words and he lost his grip on his bitch. He could hear her heels scuffle away, and her voice quivering as she sobbed through gasping breaths.

"Get back here!" Red yelled to the whore while he held tight to his broken nose. He could taste the blood in his mouth, hot and spicy. "Where the fuck ar-"

He looked around and saw the man had vanished. He wasn't finished with this asshole...

"Yoo-hoo, up here." The man called out and Red saw the man fully in his garb. He was clad in all black with uneven dirty blonde locks hanging in his face. His face looked like those guys that stood outside his apartment building's corner and did silly jokes for money. Every morning he kicked their cup of change and told the fuckers to get a job like the rest of the shitty whole world.

The man stepped off the counter and walked back to him, that stupid ass smile permanently on his face.

"Go fuck yourself." Red spit his blood at the man, the wade landed in a large strand of his hair.

Red lunged at the black figure with his knife. He moved quickly but Red turned with the man at the same time and shoved his knife into his abdomen. Red landed on his side as he hit the ground, blood dripping from his nose on the once white tiles of his kitchen. He looked up at the clown and watched as he stood upright with his knife sticking proudly upright from his side.

"Jarvis...what did I say?" He pulled the knife right out from his belly, the warm squish Red could hear as the man removed the object. Then, his skin was flawless, no mark where he had been stabbed. Red stumbled on his words to get out a phrase before the knife flew back at him and slammed into his heart. He gave no gasp before he slumped down against his cabinets.

The black figure hovered over the fat, lifeless body before kneeling over and examining the drug dealer closer. He shook his head and grabbed the handle of the knife and yanked it back out.

"See, I told you knives were dangerous." The figure scolded the body as he wiped the blood off on the dead man's shirt cuff.


End file.
